


Absent

by heartstrickledown



Category: Watchmen - All Media Types
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-07-08
Updated: 2010-07-08
Packaged: 2017-10-10 11:17:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,252
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/99158
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/heartstrickledown/pseuds/heartstrickledown
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>AU post-Karnak. Adrian/Rorschach. He doesn't remember anything from before; Rorschach is taken apart.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Absent

  
  
  
  
  
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**Warnings:** Vague body experiments, mental wreckage, vague dub-con.

His name is Dr. Robert Brown. He is told to do whatever he likes.

*

He hooks him to wires and tells him not to move, A-2, because it will hurt much worse if you move. A-2 tries not to move. He wonders who A-1 was, and if there will be an A-3. He wonders if calling him A-2 really does make it easier for them to do this.

His body reacts to the pain.

*

There was snow, wasn't there? And he'd been so exposed. Thought he'd been so exposed. When was that? His body reacts. The ceiling is smooth and black, and A-2 can see the vague shape of his body. It looks like a parentheses mark.

*

Dr. Robert Brown is a serious man with silver hair, who does not smile except when A-2 makes noises; he does his best to stay quiet. He has thin, bony hands and long, long fingers. He could be a respectable man. He's not.

Maybe he is to someone else.

*

His body reacts to the pain.

*

There were palm trees and there was a man he didn't want to trust anymore. He doesn't understand why not. It seems like such a silly, mundane thing to want - to not want to trust someone. That's what he wants the most, now, with his body in crumbling pieces and and wires attached to his pulse points and skull: Someone to trust. There are not many faces A-2 remembers. He's been here a very long time.

His back arches, and his limbs convulse. It makes him think of an orgasm. It's not one. It's his body reacting to pain.

Dr. Robert Brown is smiling.

*

A-2 still thinks he has his arm, sometimes.

*

A-2 can't remember the name he had before, but he does not want to remember because he never liked it, did he? It never fit him.

A-2 remembers black and white intersecting and that his knuckles used to ache, but he doesn't know why. He also remembers the open skull of a dog.

A-2 doesn't remember much before Dr. Robert Brown. Sometimes he doesn't remember Dr. Robert Brown.

*

He says the sensation is called a phantom limb. When A-2 asks why it hurts, he says it is because of phantom pain.

And that makes sense, doesn't it.

*

"Progress is slower than I hoped, but he is extremely resistant. He's lasted longer than anyone else."

"As I suspected. Are you still administering the full dose of immunizations?"

"Of course."

"Excellent. Call me if anything changes."

"Yes, sir."

*

A-2 likes it very much when his face burns; it's very soothing, because when he is done the skin is gone and there is something else, and it is a very old comfort. Like a security blanket. He used to - yes, when he was a child he had a blanket, didn't he? And a woman pulled the corner of it out of his mouth and said it was filthy, and he'd felt bad all the way through.

Strange.

His body reacts to the pain (his mouth curves, an upside-down bridge).

*

When he is not on Dr. Robert Brown's tables, he is in his room, which is small, and sparse, and all white. A-2 likes that there is no color and no mirrors, though it is difficult to sleep. He spends a lot of time sitting on his bed and feeling the changes to his body, like the studded metal on the stump where his arm used to be. He thinks a lot, but tries not to grasp for memories, because that chases them away. He feels anger at nothing and holds onto it because it feels right.

He doesn't feel exposed anymore. That's because of his new face.

Or maybe he does, and doesn't care anymore. He's heard - or read? - somewhere that the human body can adjust to anything, and as he is fairly certain he is still a human, he can only assume he's acclimated to the way he now lives.

*

There is something he wants to tell Dr. Robert Brown. It has to do with the palm trees, but he doesn't know how.

What he does know is this: When the pain wanes into something manageable, the words try to burst from him without his will, but his mouth will not have it, occupied as it usually is. It doesn't bother him. Some thoughts should not stay in your head. They will be said in time.

*

A-2 waits for the pain to crest. He blacks out before it does.

He wakes with an arm.

*

There is a week when he can't see. He makes do.

*

He remembers the taste of blood very well, but it's just a sense memory, and nothing concrete surfaces, even when he has a mouthful of it. He lashes out, without knowing why, knowing only that he should, that if he doesn't he'll shred like fine paper.

Dr. Robert Brown subdues him, and from then on his freedoms, earned as luxuries months ago, are revoked.

A-2 does not despair.

There is hope, so long as there is life.

*

There is one thing he refuses to release, and that is his pride. It's a nebulous, useless thing, and he doesn't know why he bothers except that it's the one thing that has remained constant. He shows no weakness, if he can. (He often can't.) He does not take Robert Brown's smiles like an animal with its stomach bared, as much of one as he may resemble.

*

Ozymandias meets him, eventually. He knows of him, through Dr. Robert Brown, and the sight of his bright, colorful clothes makes A-2's stomach churn. He inspects his head and arm and makes soft, appreciative sounds in his throat. A-2 tries to hit him, and Ozymandias smiles, his teeth in perfect rows.

"You never change, do you, Rorschach?" he says.

A-2 shuts his eyes. They're wet. He never wanted to be here.

Rorschach. That used to be his name. He remembers that. Rorschach. It meant so much to him, and they took it away. He strikes out, useless with rage.

*

A-2 stares at the space under his bed. Blood collects in his mouth. He doesn't spit it out or swallow it, just holds it there, as proof.

*

Dr. Robert Brown smiles at him, and A -- Rorschach -- opens his mouth, arches up. He can't help it. He's going to die.

*

A-2's nerves are very, very quiet. There is no stimulus but the most basic. He doesn't know how to react.

He thinks he must be dead.

*

Ozymandias strokes his face, but he doesn't feel the touch until his hand is on his neck, because of his face. He's talking, but A -- Ror -- but he doesn't understand any of the words. Ozymandias smiles.

*

Ozymandias explains how there is only the two of them. _Isn't it lovely?_ he asks. There's a pit in his stomach; he doesn't reply. _Just us,_ he says. _Nothing else is real. No one else can hurt you, nor you them. Rorschach,_ he calls him, and the shape of the name is stark and obtuse, and anything would be better than A-2 but this, _this_ covers him from head to toe with abstract purpose.

Rorschach.

His nerves are dead. He has a memory of palm trees, and the open skull of a dog, and a man he did not want to trust.

Ozymandias sets him on fire.

His body reacts, but it is not in pain; neither is it nothing.

That is enough.

_   
_


End file.
